


Flotsam

by Dichotomous_Dragon



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Drowning, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Near Death Experiences
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-14
Updated: 2016-04-08
Packaged: 2018-04-04 09:53:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4133145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dichotomous_Dragon/pseuds/Dichotomous_Dragon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cole is becoming more human. Human enough to panic, human enough to nearly die.</p><p>Companions that don't normally care much for the spirit prove otherwise.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sugarhihihello](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sugarhihihello/gifts), [mind_the_thorns](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mind_the_thorns/gifts).



> For a DAKM prompt. Gifting also to the lovely Sugarhihihello, who wrote a lovely fic about Cole and is just plain lovely in general. Also gifting to the actual OP, Mind_The_Thorns!! (thanks for letting me know!! :D)

One moment is all it takes.

At first he's walking, watching, alert and aware, wandering as the waves thrash against the stony shoreline and the steady fall of rain picks up. The next he's slipping, sliding, slamming against an unyielding wall of rock, small outcroppings grabbing at his leathers and skin. Bruises bloom under his shirt, on one knee, across one cheekbone, blue and black and purple flaring instantly against his too-pale skin. 

He hears the splash before he fully recognizes he's fallen. Darkness closes around him, cold and crashing, pulling and pushing, too dim to see, too heavy to move properly. Icy fear blooms in the pit of Cole's stomach and he flails, fighting against the invisible bonds that draw him down. _This isn't right._ Memory as bright as a sunburst sears his mind's eye even as Cole's corporeal ones are blinded by blackness. The drag against his body, the _pull_ of the current all around him, he's felt it before: familiar, frightful feelings foisted upon him when he went too far.

Now is one of those times he misses being able to forget.

The force of the water around him overwhelms Cole like the Fade did when the darkness nearly took him, clutching and caressing with hands that won't let go, that don't take no for an answer. The drag of unrelenting pressure twists and tangles his limbs into an ineffective mess as he fights, just as he did back in the Spire, though now the effort is physical as well as mental. He is not as he was, not a demon, not a ghost, but whatever he is, _he has to get out_ before he sinks down and is lost forever.

There is a problem. Up is down as well as sideways and he draws in a breath that fills his lungs but it's wrong somehow, wet and wounding and _wrong_. 

Cole's understanding comes in a wave, one that does him no more good than the ones forcing him under. Even as he struggles against the water and recognizes it as such, he realizes with a flash of fear that no one has taught him how to swim.

 

The nearby sound of a splash underwater is more like an undulation to Cole's fluid-filled ears, one more disorienting factor as long seconds-- _minutes?_ \--drag on. His muscles are wrung out, wilting, failing him in a way they have never done before; the dark shadows all around him surge for the spirit of compassion as his flailing subsides into exhaustion.

 _Will I die? **Can** I die?_ Icy fear seals his chest and Cole shuts his eyes, hoping desperately that he can, since the sea is so surely going to swallow him whole. He's still thrashing but it's less wildly now, water draining him like a Horror's wilting spell.

Cole startles and inhales more salty water as something yanks tight around his throat and drags at him, tugging and nearly tearing the collar of his shirt. It is strange to feel himself getting moved about so easily but Cole quickly forgets the oddness as someone hauls him heaving out of the surf. Clutching his chest and coughing, Cole tries to thank the figure behind him but can only gurgle, waves still washing over him at short, sharp intervals. 

"Stop frigging wiggling, Creepy!" A voice, female and frustrated, snaps in his ear. _Sera._ An arm made strong by bending a bow loops diagonally around Cole's chest and tugs him closer. "Kick--" she sputters and spits as a wave crests over their heads and fills her mouth with water, "kick your legs." She's panting and gasping, dragging him along with her, swimming as best she can against the pull of the tide. The rocky beach is accessible but it's a long ways off and they have to get around the point of the cliff face where the sheer drop cuts straight down into the swells. Cole can hear just enough to feel the flash of panic through her mind, cutting and cold.

The two of them are forced off course by a massive whitecap wave that smashes them bodily into the side of the cliff the surf is fighting against. Sera swears and nearly loses her grip, thin fingers digging into the meat of Cole's side as she struggles to keep ahold of him. Her hurts are a half-thought that yells to him and fades as her bony limbs collide with a tree's worth of driftwood and a rather large rock. Cole himself slams straight into the stone side of the cliff, unable to avoid the blow. There is a flare of pain, a burning burst of bright whiteness, then nothing.

Cole starts to wake but it's a small thing, a sliver of him, small and far off, waking and willing his eyes and ears and body to work but he can't tell where they are. The first thing he hears is a rapid stream of cursing in a female voice, a litany coursing between two pointed ears in a frantic tone he's never heard her use out loud. 

_Not breathing, not breathing! Gotta push, prolly got water in his...do demons even have those?...frig frig frig **frig**_.

A heavy, unyielding tempo, **_thump, thump, thump, thump_** booms around him then, drumbeats through the darkness that he can hear but not _hear_. Everything is disconnected and muted, separate and segregated, but the drumbeats draw Cole through the absolute blackness, a flash of himself in the form of an aching tightness in his chest that is there and gone again just as fast.

It's almost peaceful, this place. Quiet. Empty. Almost calm. 

Almost.

 ** _Thump, thump, thump, thump_** and then, past the drumbeats, a quiet voice.

"Lass, I'll--"

"I've got it, _move_." A third, far-off voice adds:

"I'll grab a blanket and the packs--" and is gone. He wavers into the darkness a little further, deaf and deadened, still not feeling properly. He isn't _him_ , something is missing. He's afloat, not in the Fade, not in the water, but somewhere he can't quite get out.

The drumbeats get louder. **_THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP---_**.

Something snaps; the shifting serenity shatters.

 

Choking, chest shaking itself apart with coughing, Cole lurches back to consciousness just as a surge of murky seawater surges out of his mouth, sea and sky and land one large mess of swirling sensation. A large hand cups behind his head, another on one shoulder; two smaller ones, slim and shaking, grab his right arm and side and roll him onto his left. He's awake and aware but confused; everything hurts, strained and sprained and smashed, and the people around him are so loud Cole can't do much beyond let them hold him as he shakes. The hands ease him back down, back flat on the stoney beach, as Cole's lungs shudder in emptiness.

A flash of blonde hair and then there are thin lips on his own, one set of fingers pinching his nose, the other gentle on his jaw. _Breathe breathe breathe **breathe** damnit!_ Cole hears her coaxing and does as he's told, focusing his scattered senses enough to inhale when she exhales, then again. A third time and the elf pulls back, snagging his hands as Cole thrashes a little and breathes on his own. Air allowed in; water expelled. He can breathe. He can _think_ , even though his body is loud with a thousand notes of complaint.

"Easy there lad." Blackwall. His are the large hands cradling Cole's head and smoothing soothing circles between his shoulder blades as he's pulled onto his side again, passageways clear and flowing, water out, oxygen in. Soon there is no more water to flow out. The warrior is kneeling beside him, the armor on his leg close enough to catch on Cole's tattered leathers. The spirit is surprised by that. It must register on his face as confusion because Blackwall adds: "We've got you, just breathe easy." Cole can't see the man's eyes (his own are closed) but he can feel dark, bushy brows knit together in concern. _Human enough to have almost died, Maker. The poor lad looks like he swallowed half the sea._

Sera doesn't speak but is just as close by. When Cole opens his eyes he can see her scowling, panting through her down-turned lips. She's shaking, body aquiver and cold, numb and niggling complaints racing through her, too. 

It takes him a moment to realize she's still holding his hands. Tight but tender, scared but solid, thumb running over his knuckles where her fingers are twined unevenly into his. She is afraid--she hates to swim, hates the rain and the sea and the surf--but there is a tiny ball of fire in her heart. She's in shock but steadfast, proud of herself and of him, which is odd. He catches her eye, then, and Sera's mouth quirks up on one side in a fierce grin.

"Bit close, yeah?" Shock and a delayed reaction have made her forget to call him "it," forget to act aloof. Cole is still too disoriented to fully understand it.

"You nearly drowned," Blackwall seconds and Cole shudders, memories of being drawn down returning far too quickly. The hands clenched around his own tighten; the one on his back goes still, sliding up to grasp one shoulder. Cole exhales a long breath as they ground him. Grounded, not sinking. _I'm okay_ he tells himself, hearing it in their heads to echo in his own.

"S'alright Creepy, we got you." The name has shifted into something else on Sera's tongue, something warmer through the chill of the rain and his soaking wet clothes. Right on cue, a blanket finds its way around his shoulders and Cole curls into the warmth. The Inquisitor glances at the elf and the man, panting from the sprint; the two of them nod. 

Cole does not expect to feel Blackwall's sturdy arms close around him but they do, slipped beneath his knees and behind his shoulders to sweep the blanket more tightly around him and Cole himself into the air.

"Back to camp with you," the warrior says kindly, settling Cole's weight against his chest. "Rest and a fresh set of armor are in order."

"Starting to smell like low tide around here," Sera snickers without heat, still smiling. The Inquisitor dumps an armful of blanket on her head and hugs her around the shoulders.

Cole's body is still chilled from its dip in the sea but he feels warm inside just the same. Comrades comforting, calming, coddling him close; his eyelids flutter closed.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hardly worth the wait, but here's the end

"--because what _else_ was I gonna do, right?" 

Cole starts to wake slowly, aching and adrift in his head, not quite sure where he is or how he got there. His chest feels like a bronto sat on it, or perhaps kicked him: lungs aching, body bruised, barely breathing because it benefits him to pull in smaller puffs of air.

"Still," someone nearby is saying, voice firm as tempered steel but amused, "You _dove in_ after him. I did not think you liked swimming." 

"I don't," Sera confirms. "Friggin' daft, 'specially in this salt nonsense, ugh," she closes with a disgusted little noise that Cole doesn't need to see to see to picture, her nose scrunched up and her lip curled as her uneven bangs bounce on her forehead. “Can you imagine what Magebits is gonna say when I come home salted like trail jerky? ‘Oh Sera, we simply must moisturize your hair,’ blah blah pffffffft.” Her Dorian voice is improving and he hears Blackwall chortle, deep voice a rumble in his glee. The steel-voiced woman isn’t distracted by the humor, though.

"--I also did not think you liked Cole." It's the Seeker who's speaking, the spirit realizes. He did 

"Yeah, well, didn't need Inqy crying if we lost Creepy, right? Plus, Dwarfy’d be crying for weeks without his mother henning to do." If anyone notices that the elf avoids answering Cassandra's accusation they don't mention it. Cole tries to sit up and feels his muscles groan and creak with the effort, a chorus of tiny hurts that usually aren’t his to hear. “Oy, speaking of…” a wide, pale face swims into focus above him and Cole blinks owlishly as Sera grins down at him, two parts feral and one part fond. “Looks like I don’t owe you _shite,_ Beardy. He’s awake!”

Blackwall’s face appears beside Sera's, Cassandra looking on from nearby. Her scar twitches as she smiles.

"Welcome back lad," Blackwall says jovially, crinkles at the edge of his eyes folded like pages dog-eared in a well-worn novel. "Feeling alright?"

"Yes," Cole replies, and tries to sit up again. He's wincing and winded, then, a moment later he gives up. He forgot. "No. I am sore," he admits. Blackwall nods and helps him sit, huge hands helping and gentle. Cole’s bones bark and whine and yowl, a chorus he drowns out. It feels good to lean against the log by the fire and he focuses on that instead.

“Taking a plunge off a cliff from that height? It’s a wonder it’s not worse,” Blackwall agrees. Sera squawks as one of those calloused palms whomps down on top of her head, fluffing her hair. She bats at him, arms flailing and accomplishing nothing but making the Warden laugh outright. “Lucky we had Fuzzhead here to dive in after you.”

“Friggin’ right,” Sera says, and the fierce grin is back. She’s proud, pleased, and the emotions are loud ones. She doesn’t lose a moment before attempting to tackle Blackwall to the ground. It would be a short trip from his position sitting but Sera lunges, misses, and has her ankle hauled up into the air in on of Blackwall’s big hands, spitting like an alley cat but laughing. “Leggo, you frigging nutter!” 

Cole hears them, each one of his thoughts it’s own little warmth, and smiles as Sera finally manages to displace Blackwall’s grip.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Always taking prompts :) thanks for reading!


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